site banner
PaperclipPerfector  21hr ago (text post)   688 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for June 27, 2025

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

So I finally took profit on COIN and decided to get my driveway redone with some of the windfall. It's a fucking disaster, washed out, weeds coming through, you name it. Thinking of going with tar & chip to the house, and then recycled asphalt back to my workshop. It's about 400+ ft of driveway total and my first quote is about $11,000. I guess we'll see how this goes.

Tar & chip seems like a good method, if properly done. Tar should prevent weeds from taking root easily, also waterproof so if there's soil being created in there (and it will be getting created in there), you can poison the crap and not risk much getting into the soil. Ofc, bad contractors can fuck it up easily.

I spent three days this week paving a 10x10' area with flagstones at the dacha. The old outdoors table was mostly rotten. Just the bloody stones, about 1000 lbs of them cost us €120, but there's nothing like those in the ground around here and we didn't want just a concrete slab.

Digging the ground level, putting in sand, buying, moving and placing the not that even flagstone to be at most +- 1/8" off the sloping horizontal plane, at most and then filling the gaps with concrete took like three days total. Hopefully it'll last at least 30+ years like other similar flagstone-paved paths at the dacha. Maybe 2-3 pros would've done it in 8 hours, I think.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats